*WISDOM FOR TODAY.*
*LIFE AND LIFE MORE ABUNDANTLY.*
*Scripture Treasure.*
John 10:10
*The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.*
Insight and Highlight.*
1 John 3:8b *"......For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.*
*Scripture Commentaries.*
God gives both life and life abundantly.
God does not just want us to have life but to have it more abundantly.
Jesus makes it clear in John 10:10b that there is a difference between life and life more abundantly.
In the beginning, it all started with just having life.
At creation, Gen 2:7 tells us that *".....the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.*
Life began at that moment. It became a right, and every man and beast had a right to live.
The devil came in Gen 3. He destroyed a lot of things, Sin was introduced, God cursed him, as the serpent and so was man.
Sin introduced toil, hardship, poverty, not every child born is guaranteed life nor every woman that goes to birth. Not everyone who works could earn a living sufficient for upkeep. Poverty and unequal distribution of wealth, sheer wickedness, mass murder, genocide, homicide, massacre, and all behavioral vices were brought into life.
This coming of Satan stole, killed, and destroyed life's enjoyment.
Life became ordinary. Life dictates to us rather that we dictate what we want in life.
Life throws at us what it wants, and we have to accept it because it is beyond our control to refuse it.
Life will not give us what we deserve.
Children of men govern life. They have become gods scheming God out of life, and life has become chaotic, ref Gen 3:5,
Ps 82:6, John 10:34:
Jesus is telling us in John 10:10 that He is the giver of life but is also telling us that Satan and his agents can make life miserable
for people who just rely on life but lack its more abundance.
The devil afflicted people's lives. The afflicted live life in sickness, poverty, yet they are alive.
People curse the day they were born, Job 3:1, Jer 20:14.
The life Jesus gives us ought not to be regretted.
What is the worth of life without good health but the presence of wealth or good health without the power of wealth or presence of good health and wealth without peace or lack of one or all of them?
Abundant life is well defined by the Apostle Peter.
He writes in 2 Peter 1:3 *His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue.*
According to Peter's writing, we can learn the following:
First, Jesus has divine power. This is potent unlimited, undefeatable, irresistible, and supernatural, ref Matt 28:18.
Second, Jesus's power gives us all things that pertain to life. His power gives life a meaning by living it more abundantly.
We live more abundantly when He gives what we need in life and what is needed to sustain it.
In life, there may be food a person craves after but no appetite, Job 33:20
There are times when there is enough food to eat, yet the appetite is not fulfilled, Eccl 6:7
There may be money but never satisfied with it, Eccl 5:10. There may be money, but not all have access to it, Matt 26:11.
There is wealth, but the power to make it is not there, ref Deut 8:18
Third, by His power, He has given us life more abundantly by adding godliness to it.
Not everybody is godly. There are both rich and poor people without godliness.
Godliness is a major winning strategy in life, ref Jam 5:16.
So His power not only gives us life, it gives us the power to acknowledge the knowledge of Him.
Such power is seen in the Apostle Paul, who wrote to seek more knowledge of Him besides what He already knew ref Philpn 3:10.
The more of Christ you know, the more your hunger and thirst for more of Him increase.
So abundant life is more than the life we live.
We all have life now, and we live in it, but when we have Christ, we will have it more abundantly!
Which life would you rather live?
Just life, or both life and having it more abundantly?
*Remorse corner.*
Jesus was telling us not to just have life, He wants to give it to us more abundantly.
*Call to Word action.*
Jesus knows the threat of Satan's mission to our life's existence: to kill to steal and to destroy. So He tells us that life in itself will not have meaning until He gives us the abundance of it and of what we need in it.
*The Christian clarion duty.*
Do not live life without having it more abundantly.
*Prayer.*
Lord, thank you for the life l live.
Please do not let me just live life but that l might have it more abundantly, in Jesus name.
Good morning all, and have a blessed day.
God bless you.
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